


Feels Like You're Only Halfway There

by eobseoyo



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Fix-It of Sorts, Gen, It's Not Actually Resurrection If You Think About It, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Post-Thor: Ragnarok (2017), Side Quests
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-22
Updated: 2018-08-22
Packaged: 2019-06-29 22:55:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15738990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eobseoyo/pseuds/eobseoyo
Summary: Thor decides to help Loki un-dead himself. It gets very silly very quickly.





	Feels Like You're Only Halfway There

**Author's Note:**

> For #5

It didn’t work out in the end. It’s not like it was the first time Thor failed at something, he’d already destroyed his whole home world, but a universe-wide failure probably outranked that. He’d essentially done the impossible, made a crazy powerful axe, nearly died, and then completely failed in the end. At this point he was ready to just go home and die. Too bad there was no home left.

“Okay,” said Steve. “I mean, that must be hard.” He looked a little distracted, and he kept staring at Vision’s weird grey corpse. It was the only corpse left, so maybe it was easier to stare at than the ground. Thor stared with him for a little longer in solidarity, since he listened to Thor’s griping. “Wait, what happened to Asgard?”

“Oh, just, sort of destroyed. Completely. And then everyone who escaped was killed by Thanos.” Thor looked around for his hammer, and then remembered it was gone and picked up his axe instead. “I’m going to go, I guess.”

Rabbit looked up at Thor, confused. “Where are you going? We need to fix this.”

“There’s not a lot left to hit or fight. I don’t know if I can really help. That’s sort of my thing, you know. The fighting part. Which I failed at,” Thor added. “I’ll be around if you need more fighting, or lightning.”

Rabbit looked ready to make Thor stick around, so he used Stormbreaker to transport himself away instead of walking. Desperate times.

\---

Thor went to the fjord in Norway where Odin had disappeared. It was the closest thing he could think of to a home, and it seemed like a good place to feel sorry for himself. It wasn’t as pleasant as the last time he was here. There were dark clouds rolling across the sky, and a sharp wind blowing in from the water. Everything seemed a lot greyer. Thor sat on a rock and stared out at the ocean.

A speck in the distance approached. As it came closer he noticed the shape of wings – a mighty seabird. Maybe it was Odin, returning to aid him in the form of an osprey or an albatross.

No, it was close enough to see that it was clearly a seagull. The bird perched on a rock near Thor.

“Father?” he asked. The seagull tilted its head and looked at him with a beady little eye. Unclear, but he was willing to take a chance.

“I’m not the leader you wanted me to be,” he told the bird. It didn’t respond. “Asgard is destroyed, both the place and the people. I couldn’t keep the universe safe. I even have this mighty axe Stormbreaker now, and I failed at using it. I need your advice, father.” He leaned in toward the seagull. “I can’t handle this alone, I need someone by my side.”

The seagull that was maybe Odin flew away. Now he had also been found wanting by his father. Or maybe a bird, but either way he was alone. He couldn’t even count on Loki to come make fun of his loneliness.

Well, couldn’t he? Loki had been dead before. It was usually just a matter of time before he showed up again to cause trouble, no matter what Thanos said. Maybe, if Thor helped him along, he would show up sooner.

\---

Thor went to the weird magic house in New York where the wizard lived. It was the first place he could think of to find books about magic, since he didn’t know how to bring Loki back from the dead off the top of his head.

Loki probably would have known, if he was there. Loki knew how to do all sorts of things that weren’t fighting. But, Thor would figure this out, and then once Loki was there they could go back to the Avengers – the surviving ones – and bring the rest of the universe back from the dead. It was a great plan. And step one of the plan was to read some books.

The door wasn’t locked, so he stuck his head in and called out, “Hello!”

There was no answer. He’d been invited in before, though, and these were desperate times. The wizard would understand. He had to wander around a little to find the library he saw last time he was here, but Thor managed to find some shelves of magic books.

He picked a blue book first and flipped through for a while. Most of the book seemed to be about portals and transportation, with a lot of math mixed in. He probably should have guessed that from the title, ‘Equations for Directionality in Transportation Spells’. He decided to pick his next book by title, instead of color.

He flipped through a book about speaking to the dead, a book about seeing the dead, and a book about healing fatal wounds. He even read a few chapters of a book about reanimating corpses, but they were all useless. He didn’t have Loki’s body, and even if he did he didn’t want to make it dance like a puppet. The magic books were useless. This whole magic house was useless.

Just as he was working up to a sulk, a loud sound interrupted his thoughts. It sounded like a bell ringing. It paused, and then started again. Thor looked around frantically, and found an old telephone sitting on a side table across the room. It rang again. Thor crossed the room and picked up the handset.

“Hello?” Thor said.

“That took you long enough,” Loki said exasperatedly.

“Loki, you’re alive! That was fast. I thought it would take longer for you to resurrect yourself, especially after what Thanos said. But this is great, now we can get together with the Avengers and- ”

“I’m not alive,” Loki said, cutting Thor off sharply.

“But you’re on the phone. Dead people can’t just call someone up, that doesn’t make sense,” Thor scoffed.

“It’s a magic phone, obviously. You’re in the Earth sorcerer’s house.” Thor imagined Loki rolling his eyes, just like old times. “I do still need your help; my energy is dispersed, and I can’t coalesce into being very quickly on my own.”

“Your energy is dispersed?”

“That’s what I said, yes,” Loki replied. “I don’t have a body, so I can’t just resurrect myself.”

“You don’t have a body?” Thor asked. “I was sure it was in space where the ship was attacked.”

“I don’t have a working body,” Loki said. “Look, are you going to help me or should I try to find another idiot standing around near a magic phone?”

“Of course I’ll help, brother! I just can’t seem to find the right book. Do you know if the wizard has a book about convulsing dispersed energy or whatever?” Thor looked back at the bookshelves. “Or maybe you can just tell me how to help, without the books.”

Loki sighed across the line, which was kind of impressive when Thor remembered that he didn’t actually have a body. Best not to think about that, probably.

“I can channel my energy into the phone, because it’s made for that,” Loki said. “But it’s just temporary. I need an energy conduit to move to something more constant.”

Thor nodded. “So, something like a transfer cable. Like putting songs on a Zune.”

“What? What’s a Zune? No, not like that at all.”

“How can you say it’s not like that if you don’t know what that is?” Thor raised a challenging eyebrow, but it was a bit wasted since nobody could see.

“I need a conduit made of energy,” Loki said. “Not a cable, more like a beam of light.”

“Ah, I’ve got it exactly,” Thor said.

“Yes, so if you get something like a large lens, and then focus it on a body-“ Loki started to explain. But Thor tuned him out, because he already had a much faster solution.

He looked quickly around the room and found an object that looked good – a nicely carved stone. He held it in one hand and pulled the phone away from his ear with the other. And then he let some lightning fly around his body.

Wind ripped around the room, and books and papers went flying. The whole phone lit up, and so did the rock. He felt something pass by him, as the lightning arced. And then everything settled again, messier than before but calm. The wizard probably wouldn’t like this.

Thor pulled the phone back to his ear. “Loki? Are you still there?” There was no response.

He looked down at the rock in his hand. “Loki? Did it work?” The rock seemed to warm up a bit. Probably. He didn’t think he was imagining it.

He opened his palm flat and held the rock up to his face. “There you are, brother! I’ve missed you. Now we’ve done magic together!” He grinned at the rock. It wobbled a little on his hand. “I know this isn’t the ideal body, but at least you’re all in one place now. Isn’t that better?”

The rock wobbled a bit harder across his palm, and then teetered off the side. Thor grabbed for it, but it fell swiftly into a potted plant next to the side table.

“Look what you’ve done now.” Thor reached down to grab the rock. Just as his hand closed around it, he felt something _pulling_ at his power, and a small arc of lightning jumped from his hand. “What was that?”

He lifted the rock up again, and looked closely at it. It looked the same, but some how it felt less than before. There was a rustling sound at his feet. Thor looked down again.

“Did you move to the plant?” he asked. The leaves seemed to perk up a bit. “Well then. I guess at least you’re actually alive again.”

\---

They didn’t stick around at the magic house for long after that. Thor wanted to know what sort of weird Earth plant his brother was now, with his long pointy leaves and strange little baby plants hanging out the side of his pot. But, none of the books in the magic house seemed to be about gardening. He supposed a wizard didn’t need to read about that if he could just magic his plants healthy.

Loki didn’t seem to appreciate this observation. He kept pointing his leaves toward the door, until Thor gathered him up and walked out into the street.

The street was very empty. It seemed like the city stretched out in all directions with no people to fill it. It was probably related to all the people Thanos killed, but it felt eerie.

“Are you sure you don’t want to chat inside?” Thor asked.

Loki rustled his leaves again, and pointed them down the street in one direction. Thor sighed and obediently started walking.

“It is nice to have you back, brother. After defeating Hela together, it felt like we were a team again, the Odinsons against the world. And then when Thanos killed you and said there would be no resurrections.” Thor cut himself off. “It was frustrating, that’s all. I was left to take care of everything on my own.”

Thor looked down at the plant, but Loki didn’t seem to have any reaction.

“Now you’re leading me around and telling me what to do, so I’m sure you’re happy,” Thor said. “Oh, did I remember to tell you Thanos killed half the universe?”

That set Loki off. He rustled his leaves, and leaned them away from Thor, and generally seemed to freak out.

“Oh don’t worry, you’re back. I’m sure we can fix it all somehow. We’ll just go find my Earth friends, the Avengers, and with your magic I’m sure we can come up with something together. Hulk is here, you know! Or at least Bruce is.” Thor rambled on, and Loki seemed to calm down a little, or at least stopped sticking the pointy ends of his leaves into Thor’s chest.

Thor noticed a store on the next corner of the street and stopped walking. He looked down at plant Loki, and then back at the store.

“You know brother, you’re far too old for me to be carrying you around everywhere. Maybe we should get you some legs.” Thor pointed toward the storefront, which displayed a series of mannequins in sportswear. “What do you think about this? It’s more body-like than the plant.”

Loki rustled his leaves and sort of waggled them oddly.

“What, are you concerned about gender? That’s not like you Loki, you’ve turned into all sorts of things to trick me before. I’m sure it’s just temporary.” Thor grinned down at the plant, but it just waggled some more. “Well, let’s give it a shot.”

Thor pushed open the door of the store, which was open, but once again there was nobody inside. He took a closer look at the different mannequins in the window. There was a silver one in shorts and an exercise bra, a blue one wearing a swimsuit, and a white one with stretchy pants and a t-shirt on. They all had weirdly blank faces, so the pants and t-shirt would probably be his best bet. He didn’t want to actively make Loki angry. He lifted the mannequin off its stand and sort of leaned it against the wall.

Thor held plant Loki up in one hand and palmed the face of the mannequin with his other. Then he let loose a little bit of lightning. Once again, a strong wind whipped through the store, and clothing went flying. The two other mannequins tipped to the floor. He felt energy pass by, and let the lightning die down.

Loki the mannequin wobbled a bit, and then slowly and stiffly stood up. He turned to look at Thor slowly. And then suddenly his strange fingerless hands flew up to his face, where a mouth would have been. He didn’t make a noise.

“Oh, I guess you would have preferred a body with a mouth,” Thor said. He grinned. “Next time.”

\---

Loki calmed down, at least, after hitting Thor with his weak little arms for a while. Then he stalked back out to the street and started walking in the same direction again.

“Where are we going, Loki?” Thor asked.

Loki gestured down the street, and continued walking.

“That’s not terribly helpful. I know you don’t have a mouth, but I’m sure you can come up with something better than that.”

Loki shrugged stiffly and gestured forward again. They continued walking down the street together. It was slower going with Loki waddling around in the mannequin body, but unless he could tell Thor where to go they couldn’t use any faster form of transport.

It was a few more blocks before he got sick of walking and started looking around for another solution. No point going to the Apple store, or a bodega, or a salon. It could be fun to put a wig or two on Loki’s weird mannequin head, but that wouldn’t be very productive right now. The pet store, though, that could be useful.

“Loki,” he called. “Loki, wait, come here. I have an idea.”

Loki turned back to look at him, and even with his stiff movements Thor could tell he was trying to sigh.

“I promise, this will help. Look, all of these bodies have mouths!” Thor pulled Loki with him into the pet store and looked around at the selection. “The fish are no good, obviously, but what about this little ball of fluff! I’m sure it can talk, and run, and be much more useful.” Thor pointed to a little cage full of wood shavings with a round brown thing in it. The brown thing was running in a little wheel, possibly generating electricity or training for sports.

“Ahhhhhhh!” screamed someone from behind the cash register. Thor turned to look at them, and so did Loki’s mannequin body. “Oh my god it’s possessed! It’s the end of times! Forgive me for my siiiiiins, Lord!” the man wailed. He was wearing an apron with a big smiling dog on it, and was grabbing at his disheveled hair. Luckily he didn’t seem to have a gun of any kind.

Thor grinned. “Hello there, sir. Are you okay?”

The man covered his face with his hands, and then peeked over his fingers. “Are you that Avenger? Thorn?”

“I am Thor, son of Odin, God of Thunder, and I’m an Avenger,” Thor said. “So close enough.”

“Why do you have a possessed mannequin with you?” the man hissed. He looked at Loki around his fingers, and then lowered his hands. “Wait, is it an alien? You’re an alien, right? You just brought this thing from space?”

“No,” Thor said. “No, well, yes. This is my brother Loki, he’s also from Asgard, so we’re both aliens. But he’s stuck in this mannequin body because of Thanos. It’s a long story.” He grinned. “You could help us, though!”

The man blinked a couple of times, and then grinned. “I could help the Avengers?”

Loki shook his head and poked at Thor with the mannequin hand. “You’d be helping Loki, and he’s not an Avenger. But you’d also be helping me, and I am an Avenger.”

“Okay,” the man said. He walked around the store counter. “Does this have to do with all the people that disappeared? Am I helping with that?”

“Sort of,” Thor said. He wasn’t entirely lying. “Right now we’re just trying to find Loki a body to use, that can talk.”

The man nodded a few times, and then stopped, considering. “A body? Like, a dead one?”

Thor looked at Loki, who shook his head. “No, we need a live one.”

Fear started to creep back into the man’s eyes. “What happens to the person already in the body?” He was shuffling back and away from Thor.

“I’m not really sure, we haven’t done that yet. Do you know, Loki?” Thor turned to his brother. Loki managed to shrug with his stiff plastic shoulders. “Well, we can just use an animal for now. I’m sure they’ll be fine.” Thor grinned back at the man.

He didn’t look convinced. “I guess you can have one of the animals. But they better be okay after, most of the pets here come from the shelter and we’ll get in a lot of trouble if they get hurt.”

“I’ll bring it back as good as new,” Thor said. “Now, which ones can talk?”

“None of them.”

“None? Not even this ball of fluff here?” Thor pointed to the round brown animal he was looking at before. It scuttled around the cage a little.

“Definitely not that one. That’s a gerbil.”

Thor looked around the store. It was full of cages and tanks with different animals inside, all looking pretty content in their homes. “What about one of these? They must be good communicators, there’s a show about them fighting crime and eating pizza,” Thor said, pointing at a turtle.

The clerk made a strange face, and then turned to one of the cages and opened it up. “Look, why don’t you just use a cat? They make plenty of sounds, even though they don’t talk.” The man turned back to face them holding up a little white animal with a lot of fur and a short tail. “This one is a kitten, a baby, but it’s healthy and makes a lot of noise.” The kitten yowled, as if to prove his point.

Thor picked up the kitten and looked at its large eyes. The kitten blinked. “This is perfect, don’t you think so brother?” He held the kitten up in Loki’s direction, and it yowled again.

Loki made his weird stiff shrug again, but he wobbled over to Thor’s side and let him grab his hand. The featureless mannequin face was always expressionless, surely the kitten would be more helpful than that.

Once again, Thor let out a bit of lightning and wind whipped around the store. A lot of the animals started making noise and stirring in their cages, but it was over soon. Loki’s energy passed from the mannequin into the kitten. He was getting pretty good at this.

As soon as Thor let his power die down, Loki squirmed his kitten body out of Thor’s grip and raced up his arm. Needle-like stabs followed his path.

“Oh, wonderful, brother. You’re armed!” Thor grinned, and wiped a bit of blood off his arm.

Loki hissed, and dug his little claws into Thor’s shirt.

\---

Thor found them a bench to sit on. It was in a little park, and there were some geese strolling around on the grass nearby. Loki hissed at the geese, but then he let Thor set him down on the bench.

“Are you sure you aren’t able to talk with that animal’s body?” Thor asked.

Loki shook his head a bit and made a low meow sound. It seemed like a pretty clear no, which was a start.

“If that’s a negative, try to make a sort of ‘yes’ sound,” Thor said.

Loki made a more inquisitive sounding meow-ow. Then he nodded his head and made a higher-pitched meow almost like a chirp.

“That’s not so bad! You can say no, yes, or ask questions. I wonder if you could write something on the ground with your hand.”

Loki managed to shrug even though he had tiny fluffy little shoulders now. Thor bet he could roll his eyes if he really wanted.

“Well, it might be faster if I ask questions first. It will be sort of like a game, where I’m guessing what you’re thinking. You were always better than me at that kind of game, but we can manage.”

Loki made one of the affirmative meows, so it seemed like the game was on.

“Are you going somewhere in New York?” Thor asked.

Loki meowed yes.

“Is there something we need here?”

Loki made one of the questioning meows.

“You’re not sure if there’s something we need?” Thor asked.

Loki meowed yes again.

“So we need something important,” Thor said. Loki nodded. Thor continued, “you think it’s here, but you’re not sure?”

Loki meowed yes.

“Is it something to do with your body?”

Loki gave another yes.

“To get it back from space?” 

This time Loki gave the lower meow, so that wasn’t right. What else could he need for his body?

“Is there something you’re missing from this body?” Thor asked.

Loki meowed yes.

“Your voice? Is that what you need?” Thor was getting excited now. He could tell he was getting closer.

Loki made the questioning meow-ow trill. So, maybe it was his voice, but it might be something else.

“That doesn’t make sense. If you need a voice that’s what you need. Unless, you need something else and you think a voice will help.” Thor paused to consider a bit more. “What else are you missing? Do you need a voice to ask for something?”

Loki meowed no sharply. Then he swatted at Thor’s hand with his little paw. He used the sharp claws, too.

“Ow! Loki, that hurt!” Thor looked down at his hand and frowned. “How are those tiny claws so effective? You must be getting desperate, you’re being even more impatient than usual. We need to find you a body that can talk, that isn’t a corpse, and that doesn’t have someone living in it already.”

Loki meowed in agreement, but it wasn’t as high pitched as before. He sounded like he was losing hope, or maybe just annoyed with Thor.

“Wait, Loki! I have an idea! I know exactly where there’s an empty body, and it’s only sort of a corpse.” Thor stood up and grabbed Loki’s kitten body. Loki scrambled out of his hands and clawed his way up Thor’s shirt.

Thor threw out his arm and waited for his hamm- his axe to come. There was a bit of distant crashing. Where had he left it, anyway? The magic house? The wizard was probably not going to be happy when he got home.

Finally Stormbreaker slammed into Thor’s hand and he transported both Loki and himself back to Wakanda.

\---

When they landed Loki leapt off Thor’s shoulder and started hissing and batting at his legs with his tiny claws again. Right, Loki hadn’t seen Stormbreaker yet.

“Do you like my new axe, brother? It’s like my hammer, but stronger, and more convenient. Maybe some day you can have one too.” Thor grinned down at Loki’s fluffy little body. Loki hissed again. “Anyway, there should be a body right around here, if they haven’t gone too far.”

Thor picked Loki up once more and tossed him over his shoulder while he looked around the little copse where he’d left behind the other Avengers. Loki being this tiny was very convenient, maybe he could find a way to make it more permanent later.

There didn’t seem to be any Avengers in the trees, but when Thor made his way out to the battle field he found what looked like all of the survivors of Thanos’ strange snap. He caught the attention of one of the soldiers nearby.

“I’m looking for the Avengers, do you know where they are?” he asked. The soldier looked confused about the angry kitten clawing its way across Thor’s scalp. “This is my brother, Loki,” he added with a gesture. Somehow that didn’t ease his confusion, but he pointed up to a large building overlooking the field.

It didn’t take long after that to make his way into the makeshift control room the Avengers had set up in the building. Nobody seemed to question his right to look for the Avengers, maybe they had seen him on TV before. They did all seem very confused by Loki though.

When he got into the room it hit him again just how many of his friends had disappeared. Steve was there, and Rabbit, and Bruce. The Black Widow was standing in the corner talking to some people he didn’t know. He wondered if any of them were Avengers now. Vison’s body wasn’t there.

“Hello, friends,” Thor said. “I’ve brought my brother, Loki. I know he’s been a bit of trouble in the past, but I think he can help with this situation.” He held out a handful of kitten and grinned. Loki hissed and started scratching at his fingers.

“I’m pretty sure you told me your brother is dead,” Rabbit said. “Also you didn’t mention him being a cat.”

“He’s new to being a cat,” Thor explained. “He was a rock, and a plant, and it’s really a long story. But I need Vision’s body.” Loki squirmed in his hand, but didn’t quite break loose.

Bruce looked confused, but he pointed to a door at the side of the room. “We put Vision’s body in there until we can figure out how to get his stone back. It shouldn’t really decay, I think, but I’m not actually that kind of doctor. What do you need it for exactly?”

“No time to explain!” Thor gave his friends another smile and walked away. It was a good excuse, especially when you were considered an important person, and he really wasn’t sure how much longer he could hold onto Loki.

Through the door he found Vision’s strange faded body lying on a cot. He held Loki out toward it so he could see.

“Thanos took the infinity stone from Vision, so he’s gone, but it’s not really a dead body because he’s part android. He’s also part lab-grown tissue. Will this fit what you need?” Thor asked.

Loki meowed in an inquisitive way, and then squirmed out of Thor’s grasp. He landed on Vision’s chest with a soft thump and sniffed at the body a bit. Finally, he turned back to Thor and gave another one of his odd kitten shrugs.

“It can’t hurt to try, right? I mean, unless something goes wrong and you can’t go into Vision’s body, and then maybe I’ll just zap you with my lightning. But life’s all about risk, so let’s go!”

Thor grabbed Loki, who tried to dodge and failed, then put his hand on Vision’s forehead. He made a little bit of lightning – this whole ordeal was really helping to improve his control. And he felt Loki’s energy pass easily into Vision’s body.

As he let go of the kitten and Previously Vision Now Loki, he noticed color coming back into the body. Not Vision’s colors, but Loki’s preferred green and black. The little white kitten jumped down off Loki’s chest and trotted out of the room with a happy meow.

Loki sat up slowly and shook his head a bit as if to clear it. Then he held his hands out in front of himself and stared at them as they glowed. He looked up at Thor, and suddenly it was Loki’s own face staring at him.

“You’re using your magic! I understand,” Thor said. “That’s what you were missing in the other bodies.”

“Yes,” Loki said. “Objects and animals clearly don’t have the same capacity for my abilities. Which is why you don’t put your brother in a rock.” He glared at Thor.

“But where were we going in New York?” Thor asked.

“I assumed Stark would have some kind of android lying around his tower.”

“Oh, he did. But then it became Vision.” Thor gestured to Loki’s current body. “And then Vision helped fight Thanos, so he was here in Wakanda. This is why it’s important to talk things out, and work together, brother! Look at the great things we can achieve as a team.”

Loki continued to glare at him. “Maybe next time you want to talk it out you shouldn’t turn me into a plant, or a kitten.”

There was a meow from the side of the room, and they both turned to see the kitten sitting in the doorway. It was looking at them expectantly.

Thor turned back to Loki. “Shall we go work together some more, and fix this Thanos problem?” He held out his arm.

Loki looked at him, considering, and then grabbed his hand. “I suppose it can’t be much more of a disaster, at this point. But if I help they have to let me keep the body.”

Thor pulled Loki up. “We can probably work something out.”

They followed the kitten out to the war room.


End file.
